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Thread: How Would You Edit Tales from Topographic Oceans?

  1. #1
    Member WytchCrypt's Avatar
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    How Would You Edit Tales from Topographic Oceans?

    A recent thread got hijacked into a discussion of the bloat or non-bloatedness of Tales and it got me wondering. Those who believe it is bloated with filler material, if you had the chance to create a tighter album, exactly which sections would you edit out and leave on the cutting room floor?

    Personally, I'm a huge fan of Tales but I would do some serious editing to Ritual...the whole drum/percussion ensemble thing is outta here...I'd also cut the lead bass part right before it at least in half or maybe a quarter. Sides 1 & 3 I'd leave as-is, but I'd do some trimming to The Remembering as well...perhaps in the fade out section.

    What about you?
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  2. #2
    Member PotatoSolution's Avatar
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    I listen to Relayer instead.

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    Oh No! Bass Solo! klothos's Avatar
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    sometimes, I think many of you have waaaay too much time on your hands.............

  4. #4
    I would edit it with a blowtorch and a shredder.
    Cobra handling and cocaine use are a bad mix.

  5. #5
    How would I edit Tales...

    ...by adding a side 5 & 6.

  6. #6
    yeselpkrimson
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    Quote Originally Posted by Supersonic Scientist View Post
    How would I edit Tales...

    ...by adding a side 5 & 6.
    Hopefully Steven Wilson is reading this. There's lots of room on those DVD-A and Blu-Ray discs...

  7. #7
    cunning linguist 3LockBox's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by WytchCrypt View Post

    I would do some serious editing to Ritual...the whole drum/percussion ensemble thing is outta here.

    What about you?
    yep, completely unnecessary
    Compact Disk brought high fidelity to the masses and audiophiles will never forgive it for that

  8. #8
    I like the YesShows version of Ritual which is even longer

    On a related note, how would you edit Beethoven's 9th??

  9. #9
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    I don't have the Mosbo book in front of me but I do recall quotes from Anderson and Wakeman (and perhaps Squire?) wherein they put forward the notion that had Tales been released in the CD era, it would have been a very different beast. Their reasoning being that they had too much material for a single album but not quite enough for a double album.
    Tales is such a polarizing album…for some the pinnacle of Yes, and for some the pinnacle of progdom. For others, the beginning of the end or the ultimate example of "the excesses of prog". Wilson himself is a fairly polarizing figure in the prog world…a genius to some, an overrated revisionist historian to others. Assuming he is in fact working on Tales, it will be interesting to see what he does with it. My hope is that Tales gets another day in court, much like King Crimson's "Lizard" received when it got the Wilson treatment. I don't know that an edit is necessary to make that happen. I wouldn't be averse to it so long as the original is left intact within the package as well. And frankly, it would be interesting to hear--especially if the band had input--what they might consider doing if they had an opportunity to revisit Tales.
    All rather fun but useless speculation though…if Wilson is doing Tales and/or other 70s Yes titles, he's got to be close to finished by now and with Yes recording their new album and a busy tour schedule, their time to get involved in such things is pretty minimal (other than approving completed mixes).

  10. #10
    Oh No! Bass Solo! klothos's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by trurl View Post

    On a related note, how would you edit Beethoven's 9th??
    This is actually kinda my point

    My problem with "Tales" is that it is 80 minutes of 4 songs. I do not have the time (due to my real life situation) to sit down and listen to it uninterrupted nor do I have the kind of time/lifestyle to ponder subjects such as "how can we edit this album to make it more appealing".

    This doesn't mean I would like it changed or edited....It is the way it is because it is the way it is and its fine that way.

    This would be like discussing how to remove ingredients from a large cake to make it more appealing. The answer is simple: you can't. Yes is who they are because of albums like "Tales".

    Albums and artists do not need to conform to the listener -- it is the listener that makes the choice to conform to the artist to either like, dislike, criticize, worship, etc the artist/material
    Last edited by klothos; 05-30-2014 at 04:47 PM.

  11. #11
    I'd make it even greater by making it quadruple!

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    Quote Originally Posted by trurl View Post
    I like the YesShows version of Ritual which is even longer

    On a related note, how would you edit Beethoven's 9th??
    You re comparing ToTO with Beethoven's 9th?!? ROTFLMAO!

    1. Cut down RSoG to 15 minutes (easy to do)

    2. Cut down Remembering and Ancient to ten minutes (very easy to do)

    3. Cut down Ritual to 15 minutes (easy to do).

    4. Put Bruford on drums.

    5. Add some balls to Jon...

    ...and you would have an album that would at least approach Close To The Edge.

  13. #13
    Quote Originally Posted by trurl View Post
    I like the YesShows version of Ritual which is even longer

    On a related note, how would you edit Beethoven's 9th??
    Yeah see your point. 9th does drag its feet at times!

  14. #14
    Member Zeuhlmate's Avatar
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    Its not perfect - what is ?, but its a statement as it is.
    Why change it? If you dont like it, listen to something else, or grab your instrument of choice.

  15. #15
    Actually I have a DJ Spiral copy that breaks the album into segments, almost like individual songs. Now if only I knew how to edit the best parts together ?

  16. #16
    Member Digital_Man's Avatar
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    I personally like Ritual and at least most of the revealing science of god the way it is. The Ancient is interesting but that might benefit from some trimming. When Rick Wakeman said that Tales had way too much padding on it I believe he was probably referring mostly to "the remembering" which is the one I would edit the most. It has too much of the "alternate tune" thing going on and just repeats itself too much. However, I think The Flower Kings and Spock's Beard are also guilty of too much padding but for some reason Tales always gets the blame. There's a track on Spock's Beard's "V" album that has a lot of padding and is just too long(I believe the 24 minute track). I'm not as familiar with Transatlantic but I'm guessing they are culpable to some degree as well.

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    I really like "alternate tune' repeats.. what I'd cut to at least to a half, is the intro to Ritual. I mean that short riff, going on and on relentlessly..

  18. #18
    Member Vic2012's Avatar
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    I wouldn't.

  19. #19
    Quote Originally Posted by cavgator View Post
    You re comparing ToTO with Beethoven's 9th?!? ROTFLMAO!
    Sure I am. As a magnum opus of the artist in question I'll equate them all day long even if I wouldn't objectively say one is as great as the other. Tales is certainly an important enough artistic statement to not have some schmuck take a razorblade to and deface. I think Klothos summed it up well...

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    Quote Originally Posted by WytchCrypt View Post
    What about you?

    I listen to Fragile instead. They never improved on that.

  21. #21
    Highly Evolved Orangutan JKL2000's Avatar
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    I'd probably add some extended guitar solos, and stretch out some keyboard solos too. Give Jon a somewhat long, free form vocal solo/ space out section. Make the whole thing a bit more smoky, with a "floating in an opium den " vibe to it.

  22. #22
    Subterranean Tapir Hobo Chang Ba's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Vic2012 View Post
    I wouldn't.
    Ditto
    Please don't ask questions, just use google.

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    Quote Originally Posted by trurl View Post
    Sure I am. As a magnum opus of the artist in question I'll equate them all day long even if I wouldn't objectively say one is as great as the other. Tales is certainly an important enough artistic statement to not have some schmuck take a razorblade to and deface. I think Klothos summed it up well...
    If i remember my latin, "magnum opus" means "great work." Yes's magnum opus was Close To The Edge, at least in the eyes of the vast majority of progressive rock enthusiasts. Even among us (except for yes diehards), Tales From The Topographic Oceans was panned. When it was released, it was a pompous, overblown wreck, and concertgoers struggled to get through it before they played their better stuff. It was indeed an endurance contest to get through Tales in its entirety.

    Below is a typical review of the album I copied out of a book by a Rolling Stone writer. It hurt, because I like Yes and think this is just another guy who hates prog, but he has points.

    "We were in Tokyo on tour and I had a few minutes to myself in a hotel room before the evening's concert. Leafing through Paramhansa Yoganda's Autobiography Of A Yogi, I got caught up in a lengthy footnote on page 83. It described the four part Shastric Scriptures which cover all aspects of religion and social life as well as some fields like medicine and music, art and architecture. For some time, I have been searching for a theme for a large-scale composition..."

    So begins singer Jon Anderson's ponderous liner notes to the most ponderous album by the most ponderous of all British art-rock groups, Yes (Zzzzzzzz...). As you can judge from the above pseudo-explanatory excerpt, Tales From The Topographic Oceans is a seventh-hand distillation of world thought, according to five of the most diffuse personalities (hence, when brought together, produced the muddled thinkers) ever to try to coexist in a rock group. keyboardist Rick Wakeman and drummer Alan White are the only two genuine rockers of the bunch, although Wakeman's idea of inventiveness was often to try to coax fart noises from his Hammond B-3 organ while White was so bewildered by the band's elaborate non-arrangements that he neglected to keep a beat.

    Bassist Chris Squire was a frustrated guitar player who stuffed every open space in a song with too many notes, and guitarist Steve Howe's sub-classical playing sought (successfully, alas) to distance himself irrevocably from the blues base of rock guitar. They topped all this off with Anderson's airy, high register singing, which aimed to be innocent and childlike but in fact was insolent and childish. Anderson sprayed off Maslov-derived platitudes with all the comprehension and sincerity of a non-English speaker reading letters off a page. In other words, disaster was inevitable.

    Tales From The Topographic Oceans is a long, long eighty-one minute song broken into four sections. The wobbly sections have only tenuous connections, which break upon any serious inspection. The lyrics are Eastern mystical psychobabble (why don't British art-rockers make fools of themselves with the blatherings of European philosophers? not as cool), heavily weighed down by dragging tempos. As soon as a song gets almost fast enough to generate interest, the drums immediately slip away and we're stuck with Anderson warbling ethereally about mountains or birds. The birds could fly, the mountains weren't so lucky.


    I think this review is unfairly harsh, but this wasn't written for The Yes Album, Close To The Edge or Fragile. The review was rather representative of the scathing responses received by a press corps that were at best, very disappointed, and at worst, utterly contemptuous. If Jon was a longtime student of metaphysics, as Jamie Muir was, then perhaps he could have made better sense of it all (according to Bruford, it was Muir who put this into Jon's head, not some hotel room in Tokyo, and Broof's story makes a lot more sense). More than any other album in the genre, Tales exemplified the bloated excess and pomposity of the genre for any and all to attack with relish. They could not possibly duplicate the studio perfection of Close To The Edge, but they tried, and due to the recording constraints, they were not able to cut it up enough to make a killer single album. Had it been on a 50-minute CD, it would have been far better, as there are moments of sheer beauty on it.

    Although Yes was occasionally astonishing on Relayer, in my opinion, Tales was the point where Yes jumped the shark. It is an important statement, but not for the right reasons. Bob Dylan's Self Portrait was also a statement. Will it be played 200 years into the future, as Beethoven is played? It is scarcely played now, except by their devoted fans who likes pretty much anything the band puts out...

  24. #24
    I'd have Side Two go from that first verse right into the "Don the cap and close your eyes" section without ever going back to the "slow" stuff that comprises the second "verse" - then before the amped up stepdown that brings them back into "Stand! On hills of long forgotten yesterdays" with Howe playing those great licks, I'd have inserted all of the energized Side 4 stuff, with the "da da da da dah, da da dah da da dum" and the bass solo, so that the entire Side Four is gone but for that bit, making Side Two a masterpiece instead of a start-stop-get interesting-get dull again piece. It'd be three great pieces instead of four.

  25. #25
    Member Joe F.'s Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Vic2012 View Post
    I wouldn't.
    Agreed.

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